It was hot. The sun had set. A low glow sat atop the horizon of a jagged group of three and four story buildings. Layers and planes, chunks of darkness, and silhouettes against the fading light, drew down a one point perspective to a shimmering blue glow around the outdoor seating of the sushi restaurant. The skies were clear with only two slight wispy clouds low in the indigo-gray sky. They floated above a small gabled peak and its window.
A car crept around the corner, interrupting the darkness. It beamed forward into squinting eyes before angling a four point turn into a skinny parking spot. When the headlights cut out the blue lit facade around the restaurant exposed two people, their silhouette, each leaning on the brick walls that faced each other. Both were smokers as they puffed and dragged down a break time cig. The smoke rose dark against the light.
The skinny alley was cobbled and dead ended into 10th street. Most vehicles were forced to keep a tire on the curb and close to the adjacent brick wall. The path, as it might rather be called, acted as the base or stage of a thin projected image. Only eight feet wide but almost infinitely tall. A small slice of city life glowed on its skinny screen. The darkness, beginning with dusk, framed the action as the endless reel unfolded. The intermittent focus, broken by the elements of life and nature, passed by on the narrow alleyway exposing a split moment in time.